Joining Mary and Nigel this week is Mia Michaels. Does Mia need glasses? She's always squinting. And because her favourite, Ricky, got eliminated last week, she pulls the "America got it wrong" bullshit that always grates when a reality show is a goddamn popularity contest. And really, America's even less wrong in this instance, because the judges eliminated someone in the bottom three instead of just letting the person with the fewest votes go. So is she really saying the judges got it wrong? Whatever -- good to know we're treating the Elimination of Ricky like it was a crime against humanity. Nigel says he dislikes "dance snobs," who think you need years of formal training to be a dancer. This length of this discussion is way out of proportion to my interest in it, especially the longer it goes.

Contemporary jazz dancer Lauren was a tomboy whose mom wanted her to do something girly. Neil started dancing because he and his twin brother were hot for a dancer in their preschool class. This week they're doing some hip-hop. Dave Scott is a "hard-hitting" choreographer from hit films like Stomp the Server or something. "The Way I Are" by Timbaland is the music. Lauren has on kind of a lacey black tutu. Neil's in black shirt and pants with a grey or white striped tie. When he's straight up hip-hop, he looks like he should be in a Weird Al Yankovic rap parody video. Or that Offspring one. He's better when he manages to make the hip-hop very balletic and acrobatic, at one point leaping over Lauren into a somersault. Mia says it was a lot better than their samba last week. Mia says tells Neil that he "tore this up" and says Lauren wasn't quite "bringin' it" yet. I'd trust her opinion a little more if they didn't show us so many clips of her drooling over male contestants. Mary babbles on about how their chemistry is improving. Nigel is complimentary of both of them, not just the one he wants to sleep with. They've set the bar for everyone who's going to be working out of their style. Except Lauren wasn't working out of her style!

Pasha got into ballroom dancing from watching it in Moscow as an eight-year-old. Jessi was an embryo when she felt the love, and it's a celebratory art form. They talk about their family members; Jessi thinks of her grandfather, who always wanted her to have good manners, and Pasha wishes his mother could be here to see him. This week, they're doing some jazz dancing. Tyce Diorio has created an "African-modern-contemporary feel." Which apparently means dancing like a bird. "Stiff Jazz" by d'Zihan and Kamien. Jessi flits about on stage while Pasha dance-stalks her for a while. They appear to be wearing feathers. There is much hopping, the two of them, in their brown tops. There is preening, and punching the air. They do seem quite birdlike, although I don't think the male bird would mount the female bird in the missionary position. At one point I think they walk like Egyptians.

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